Lakeside Fastpitch Success in Seattle
The Lakeside fastpitch squad took the 1:00 p.m. ferry to Bainbridge Island Friday, April 15th, and sailed back with a 7-5 win over the Seattle Times state 3rd ranked Metro Conference 3A Bainbridge Spartans (7-2).
The next morning the Eagles took charge of the University of Washington's Husky Softball Stadium as the home team and pounded the KingCo 4A Redmond Mustangs (6-2) 8 runs to 2 in the first inning of the 9:30 a.m. game, eventually coming away with an 8-4 win in the annual Washington State High School Softball Festival to remain undefeated and take their overall record to 8-0. The game ended after 4-1/2 innings due to a one and a half hour time limit imposed by the festival's five-game schedule.
Prior to Friday's loss, Bainbridge had outscored eight opponents 104 runs to 11, including shutouts of Cleveland, Eastside Catholic, West Seattle, Seattle Prep and Lakeside School (Seattle). Redmond had outscored seven opponents 80 runs to 28 prior to meeting the Eagles Saturday.
Offensive highlights included Lakeside sophomore first baseman Nikki Tiffany's home run over the 200' portable outfield fence in the Friday game and senior third baseman Kayla Sevier's bomb hit high over the purple monster outfield wall just left of the centerfield scoreboard at Husky Field. Junior lefty pitcher Vanessa Ahrendt went the distance in both games and upped her season record to 7-0.
Lakeside is knotted at the top of the Northeast A League with last year's 2A state runner ups Colville Indians -- who dropped down to 1A in the most recent WIAA reclassifications -- with 5-0 league records. The Indians have outscored nine opponents 107-9 with shut outs of Newport, Freeman, Riverside and Chewelah.